Foreign pressure stalls Pakistan’s data protection law as Hajj applicants’ details leak on dark web

The shocking revelation that the personal data of nearly 300,000 Hajj applicants has been leaked on the dark web has raised serious concerns. While the Pakistan Telecommunication Authority (PTA) chief admitted even his own SIM details were compromised as far back as 2022. Senator Afnan Ullah Khan warned that foreign pressure is holding back a long-awaited data protection law.

On Friday, while briefing the Senate Standing Committee on IT chaired by Senator Palwasha Khan, the PTA chief disclosed that cases of data theft had already been reported on the dark web in 2022. He noted that SIM data remains with the telecom companies, and a formal inquiry into the matter had been carried out the same year.

The Senate Standing Committee on Information Technology also confirmed that Pakistan is being pressured internationally to avoid legislation on data protection. Chairman PTA stressed that it is still unclear how and from where this stolen data appears on the dark web, which makes a thorough investigation all the more urgent.

Senator Afnan Ullah, meanwhile, pointed out that Pakistan is under external pressure not to pass a law ensuring data protection. During the session, members of the standing committee expressed their frustration over the poor quality of mobile phone services nationwide, especially frequent dropped calls.

Senator Afnan Ullah further underlined the financial scale of the issue. He explained that data is stolen from multiple institutions, then compiled and sold. Its value runs into billions of rupees.

Without a proper law, theft will continue, and the losses will multiply, he warned.

Drawing a regional comparison, he pointed out that when srael attacked Iran, they were able to access critical information by extracting social media and internet data of key Iranian figures. Similarly, Pakistan’s data remains exposed.

He criticised the Ministry of IT for failing to table a data protection bill, calling it a sign of incompetence.

Officials from the IT Ministry told the committee that work on the draft bill is still underway and consultations with stakeholders are in progress.